MYANMAR
Rebels admit beheadings
A rebel group yesterday said its members beheaded two prisoners in a rare admission of deadly violence, as it fights to maintain control of the western borderlands. The incident, which “violated military discipline,” occurred in February last year during an Arakan Army (AA) offensive on Kyauktaw township in Rakhine state, group spokesman Khaing Thu Kha said. “Our local [AA] militias were unable to control their anger and committed crimes ... in retaliation for the terrorist Myanmar army soldiers who had unjustly arrested, tortured and killed their families,” he said. In a two-minute clip that circulated on social media, about seven men, some wearing AA uniforms and holding firearms, kicked and beat two shirtless men on the ground. In another video, the same alleged killers were seen beheading the captives with machete-like knives.
PHILIPPINES
Manila amenable to Interpol
Manila would respond favorably if Interpol is asked by the International Criminal Court (ICC) to issue arrest warrants related to its probe into former president Rodrigo Duterte’s bloody “war on drugs,” a top official said yesterday. Thousands of people were killed in Duterte’s crackdown on drugs launched in 2016, many in mysterious circumstances, prompting the ICC to launch an investigation into possible crimes against humanity. Duterte and police have denied activists’ allegations of systematic executions and cover-ups, and say drug suspects were killed in self defense. “If the ICC makes a move, and courses the move through the Interpol, and the Interpol makes the request to us for the arrest of delivery of the custody of a person subject to ICC jurisdiction, we will respond favorably or positively to the Interpol request,” Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin told a media briefing.
UNITED KINGDOM
Rolls-Royce wins sub deal
The Ministry of Defence yesterday said it had awarded Rolls-Royce a ￡9 billion (US$11.2 billion) eight-year contract to design, make and provide support services to nuclear reactors that power its fleet of submarines. The deal would strengthen the Royal Navy’s continuous at-sea deterrent — under which at least one nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarine patrols the seas at all times — while also boosting the AUKUS defense pact with the US and Australia, the ministry said. Minister of Defense John Healey said the contract with Rolls-Royce, which also makes engines for aircraft, would save the kingdom ￡400 million over eight years by combining multiple contracts into one.
FRANCE
Fake tracks swamp Deezer
Music streaming site Deezer yesterday said that one in 10 tracks uploaded to the streaming service each day is either fake or just noise created by artificial intelligence programs. The company’s fraud detection technologies, rolled out in 2023, discovered that “around 10,000 tracks completely generated by AI are uploaded to the platform every day, representing around 10 percent of the total,” the Paris-based firm said in a statement. The success of its technologies, which can identify AI content “without the need for extensive training on specific databases,” had led it to seek two patents last month. Deezer says it aims to pay genuine musicians better by weeding out fake songs that are then streamed by fraudulent accounts created in order to remunerate the “artists.” Many fake tracks can clone the voices of existing artists, which currently cannot be copyrighted, or copycat popular songs.
When Shanghai-based designer Guo Qingshan posted a vacation photo on Valentine’s Day and captioned it “Puppy Mountain,” it became a sensation in China and even created a tourist destination. Guo had gone on a hike while visiting his hometown of Yichang in central China’s Hubei Province late last month. When reviewing the photographs, he saw something he had not noticed before: A mountain shaped like a dog’s head rested on the ground next to the Yangtze River, its snout perched at the water’s edge. “It was so magical and cute. I was so excited and happy when I discovered it,” Guo said.
TURNAROUND: The Liberal Party had trailed the Conservatives by a wide margin, but that was before Trump threatened to make Canada the US’ 51st state Canada’s ruling Liberals, who a few weeks ago looked certain to lose an election this year, are mounting a major comeback amid the threat of US tariffs and are tied with their rival Conservatives, according to three new polls. An Ipsos survey released late on Tuesday showed that the left-leaning Liberals have 38 percent public support and the official opposition center-right Conservatives have 36 percent. The Liberals have overturned a 26-point deficit in six weeks, and run advertisements comparing the Conservative leader to Trump. The Conservative strategy had long been to attack unpopular Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, but last month he
Chinese authorities said they began live-fire exercises in the Gulf of Tonkin on Monday, only days after Vietnam announced a new line marking what it considers its territory in the body of water between the nations. The Chinese Maritime Safety Administration said the exercises would be focused on the Beibu Gulf area, closer to the Chinese side of the Gulf of Tonkin, and would run until tomorrow evening. It gave no further details, but the drills follow an announcement last week by Vietnam establishing a baseline used to calculate the width of its territorial waters in the Gulf of Tonkin. State-run Vietnam News
PROBE: Last week, Romanian prosecutors launched a criminal investigation against presidential candidate Calin Georgescu accusing him of supporting fascist groups Tens of thousands of protesters gathered in Romania’s capital on Saturday in the latest anti-government demonstration by far-right groups after a top court canceled a presidential election in the EU country last year. Protesters converged in front of the government building in Bucharest, waving Romania’s tricolor flags and chanting slogans such as “down with the government” and “thieves.” Many expressed support for Calin Georgescu, who emerged as the frontrunner in December’s canceled election, and demanded they be resumed from the second round. George Simion, the leader of the far-right Alliance for the Unity of Romanians (AUR), which organized the protest,
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